


The Life and Times of Harlequin Rose

by dogtit



Category: DCU (Comics)
Genre: F/F, Gen, [puts on sunglasses] be the change you want to see in the world., because again. this is self indulgence hour., lucy raised by the sirens au, starfire/raven is only slightly hinted at thanks to an original character, super self indulgent au time go.
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-04
Updated: 2019-10-03
Packaged: 2020-11-23 06:28:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,083
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20887619
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dogtit/pseuds/dogtit
Summary: Lucy Quinzel has many things; superpowers, a place in the Teen Titans, two and a half moms, a pet hyena, and a lot of fun stories. And some not so fun ones. But, mostly fun.





	The Life and Times of Harlequin Rose

**Author's Note:**

> its almost 2020 and i can do what i Want. 
> 
> canon and ages are All over the place. there's no set universe outside of "its dc, so whatever". there are two whole ocs here and they're both fan babies, but they're side characters (unless the response for them is Good?) so don't even worry about it!!! they're only here for bants!!! i'll tag in more ships and characters as they become relevant. 
> 
> i hope yall enjoy!!!

The plants told her first. 

There was a  _ tingle _ , the Green reacting all around her with a low, pleased hum. Not the  _ entire _ Green, mind; that vast network of beauty and life, that was at the fringes of Ivy’s consciousness. It had to be, for the sake of her own (remaining) sanity. It could be... _ difficult _ with just the plantlife in Gotham, especially her homegrown babies, dwelling and brushing against the core of her mind, whispering secrets in ways Ivy could not always comprehend. She was more plant than human, but her brain and some core organs were still, regrettably, homosapien in nature.

So, the plants could not speak, not like Ivy could. But they  _ felt _ , and they transferred that to Ivy, and so for days, all week, Ivy had felt the  _ humming _ . In her greenhouse there was new growth, new life, and the Green celebrated it. The problem was that  _ Ivy _ couldn’t find it, not even when she spoke through the Green. It kept her on edge.

It was  _ vexing _ . More than once her temper had gotten the better of her, and she’d nearly snarled an admonishment to Harley for something so minor as humming at breakfast. Selina, perhaps sensing it, had drawn Ivy’s attention toward her with a well timed kick to the shin. 

It wasn’t exactly  _ healthy _ , no, but Selina was a big girl, and Harley had been through enough the previous week already, what with the Joker delivering his  _ special _ brand of tough love. Ivy had apologized in private, later, while Harley had been distracted with a nap on the sofa. Selina had simply shrugged, said that Ivy could pay her back later, and everyone went on with their day.

There it was again! Ivy gnashed her teeth and practically sprinted for the greenhouse as the humming started again. She hadn’t expected Harley to be in as well, but that was alright; Harley liked to talk to the flowers the two of them had planted together, and the flowers soaked up her jokes and smiles like sunshine and water. It wasn’t just Ivy that bloomed when Dr. Quinzel cartwheeled back into their lives, after all. 

“Oh! Hey, Red!” Harley chirped, leaning back on her elbows, stretching out on the grass. Ivy had to do a brief doubletake; surrounding Harley were wild riots of flowers. Baby’s Breath, Bleeding Heart, Mountain Laurels, all things Ivy had planted  _ elsewhere _ in the greenhouse. Ivy had a reputation for her botanical obsession, of course, but this seemed strange even for her.

“Hello, darling,” Ivy muttered absently, already scanning through the Green for answers. Were the displaced flowers the source of that strange, itching hum? Couldn’t be. They were too, hm,  _ small _ for what the Green promised. “You haven’t seen anything amiss, have you?”

“In your lil Eden? Not really.” Harley sat up. A chorus of disappointment breathed against Ivy’s ear, the flowers mourning their loss of contact with the immune Harley; all flowers yearned to be loved, especially the particularly poisonous ones. “Why? Everythin’ okay?”

“Something’s... _ growing _ ,” Ivy said vaguely. She paced through her territory, checking on her experimental specimens; flytraps with projectile spines to incapacitate their new mammalian prey, fungi cultures brimming with various spores to wreak havoc on the unprepared nervous system, venomous snapdragons that defended themselves with tiny, thorny teeth. 

Ivy had no plans to use any of them, in truth; they were pet projects at most, things to expand her horizons with. Too lethal to use in Gotham. For now, of course. 

“Well that answers jack,” Harley giggled. A new clutch of  _ amaryllis _ cheered as Harley settled back down. “What  _ ain’t _ growin’ in here? Hey, uh, speakin’ of...you feelin’ okay, Red? There’s an awful lot of flowers crowdin’ me over here.” 

“Hm?” Ivy lifted her head from a rack of blood sucking succulents to show Harley she was paying attention, then ducked back down to search under the table.  _ Maybe some new seeds snuck underneath here…? _ “Yes, I’m fine. I just need to find this new phenomenon, give me five minutes.” 

She paused. Slowly lifted her head back. Harley was practically buried under new flowers now. Foxgloves burst from the churning soil to lay across Harley’s knees, and marigolds crowded beneath her pale fingers just for her touch. Life  _ teemed _ around Harley’s stunned body, shivering in pleasure with each skin-to-petal contact. 

With the intelligence and wisdom her meta-human status and her PhD afforded her, Ivy said, “ _ Um? _ ” 

“Yeah,” Harley squeaked. “I  _ know  _ you’re happy to see me, Pam, but this is a little...much?”

“I-it’s not me.” Ivy said. And it was true; the Green itself was reacting. Perhaps the tiny fraction of the Green tied into Ivy’s own subconscious, sure, but… 

The humming intensified. Tiny thorns rose from Ivy’s skin like goosebumps. Had she maintained any body hair after her evolution, Ivy assumed that it would all be standing on end. Releasing a hard breath, she closed her eyes. 

The serum she’d given Harley had been founded with a tiny, minuscule strip of Ivy’s own DNA, just a touch of blood. After all, the basis of a vaccine was to give the immune system a deactivated copy of what could kill its host. Granted, it was little more complicated than that, considering she was reverse engineering the process that essentially created her, but it was doable. 

She’d even programmed it to evolve with time; sync the serum with her own evolution, to make sure that the one human on the planet she cherished above all others didn’t drop dead. It was a decision made in her youth that Ivy couldn’t regret, no matter how Harley left her. It just meant that there was a bit of Green in Harley’s body, too; the plants recognized it and cherished her for it, though Harley herself would never control or commune with them like Ivy could. It also let Ivy peer through Harley’s blood in a way no human doctor could match. 

She peered then. Harley ran a normal temperature, no signs of sickness, and the bruises and spiderthread thin fractures along her left arm were healing without incident. But the humming was  _ loud _ in Harley’s blood, a sound that deafened Ivy even before she reeled herself back into her body with a gasp. 

“Harley,” she said, thankful that her voice didn’t tremble. Much. “Come here, sweetpea.” 

“Yeah, sure! Hey, lemme up, guys. C’mon, vamoose.” Harley wriggled from her fairy glade prison; the Baby’s Breath had crawled up and woven itself in her pigtails. Ivy met her halfway, and took up a hand. 

“Do you trust me?” Ivy asked seriously. 

“Course I do.” Harley tilted her head. Her expression was growing concerned. “Ivy? You okay?”

“There’s going to be a pinch.” Ivy smoothed her thumb over Harley’s index finger. “Not a needle pinch, but. It might hurt. I’m sorry, but there’s just something I have to check.” 

“O-Okay.” 

Ivy hesitated. “When was your last period, by the way?”

“Oh, geeze,” Harley huffed, chewing on a lower lip. Her eyes rose up to the lights in thought. “I honestly can’t tell ya, they’re pretty inconsistent. Ummm...I know I for sure had one the month before last.” Harley looked back to Ivy. “What’s this about?”

In lieu of an answer, Ivy turned her thumbnail into a thorn-sharp claw, and pricked Harley’s index finger. Before the woman could yelp Ivy pulled the digit into her own mouth, sucking away the blood, modifying her own biochemistry to swap her saliva for an anti-bacterial numbing agent along the way. 

Ivy released Harley’s hand, swallowing. Her body and mind were roving over the sample, picking it apart by the molecules as Harley shifted on her feet. 

“Ooo-kay,” Harley said, slow and creaky, fumbling for her usual humor. Morning Glories were curling up by her ankles. “I have t’ask. Are we doin’ a Little Shop of Horrors thing here? I think I read an Audrey/Audrey II fanfiction once, and I gotta say, it was  _ kinda _ hot. I could get into it. Picture it, baby, battered blonde beauty and her bloodthirsty boo who’s like, huge, and got tentacles--”

Ivy’s eyes widened. “You’re pregnant.”

“--and look we  _ all _ thought about it when it was creepin’ up her dress, like, hubba hubba am  _ I what now _ ?” 

“Harley,” Ivy said, her voice tense, an urgent whisper. “Harley, you’re  _ pregnant. _ ” 

“Nah,” Harley said at once. She shook her head. “Nah, nah, nah, I--nah.  _ Nah _ . I can’t--I can’t be. There’s no--I c-can’t be.” 

“Harley. You  _ are. _ Judging by the HCG levels I could taste in your blood, you’re about three, four weeks along.” 

Harley began to tremble. Her arms wrapped around her abdomen and her lips parted. The human stink of her fear was carried on her quick exhales, rapid fire bursts that tickled Ivy’s collarbones. She searched Ivy’s equally terrified expression, perhaps for signs that it was a poor joke, but Ivy wasn’t sure why she bothered; they both knew that Ivy couldn’t tell a joke to save her life. 

“Oh,” said Harley. “Oh, well, shit.” 

Ivy summoned the vines to catch her as she fell into a dead faint. 

~~

“Wait,” Blue Beetle sputtered. “Your mom  _ fainted? _ ”

“With  _ you _ in there?!” Aquagirl squeaked over the comms.

“Your mom’s into tentacle hentai?” Corvaefire asked dryly.

“First of all, it was my  _ mama _ , Poison Ivy is my  _ mom _ . Secondly: yes, yes, and maybe? Probably.” Harlequin Rose rolled her eyes. “If we’re shifting subjects, can we not start with what my mama is or isn’t into? My tum’s still full of pizza and I don’t wanna lose it all over the sidewalk.” 

She leaned over the edge of the roof. Hummed. 

“Actually, there’s a MAGA hat dude down there, maybe if I aim it right…”

“May I remind you,” Robin seethed quietly in their ears, “that tonight is  _ not _ about frivolity nor nostalgia?”

“Here we go,” Blue Beetle muttered. 

“This is an official Titans  _ stakeout _ . The communications channel is for status updates and emergencies only.”

“I could go for steak,” Aquagirl chirped.

“Oh, same,” agreed Corvaefire. 

Robin inhaled deeply. “I hate all of you. I should have done this on my own.”

“Probably!” said Blue Beetle. “So what happened next, Rose?” 

Harlequin Rose, in the middle of carefully dangling a (slightly) acidic loogie from her lips, could not immediately reply. She only had one shot, and she wanted it to land right on the dude’s head. It’d only eat through the hat; most of the toxin would be gone by the time her phlegm made contact with his hair. The most harm it would do to him as a person would be to ruin the mop of stringy, bleach fried blonde hair she could see sticking out from the brim. He’d have a somewhat tender bald spot, but he’d live.

“Rose?” Beetle prodded slightly. “Hey, you okay?”   
  


“Nn-hn,” Harlequin Rose managed. 

"You sound like you are in pain!” Aquagirl gasped.

“Nn-nn!” 

“Are you bound? Gagged?! Robin, go check on her!” Beetle demanded.

“What?!” Robin had the gall to sound affronted. “Why  _ me? _ You’re closest, unless you decided to insult me further by moving from your strategic position--”

“Because when I fly I make  _ noise _ , bro.” 

“Shall I go and check on our tiniest and friendliest? I volunteer!” Across the crackling radio, there was the sound of sloshing water. 

“No! Stay!” Robin snapped. “It’s like herding  _ cats _ .” 

Harlequin Rose let her loogie fall.  _ Bullseye! _ She ducked back quick as a flash or a Flash, grinning to herself. “Everybody relax. I’m okay! Just had to do a lil somethin’.”

“Were you pooping?” 

“I was not pooping, Aquagirl.”

“ _ You’re all so fucking stupid _ ,” Robin said on a hiss. 

There was an explosion. The warehouse the team had been staking out was going up in roaring flames; henchmen scrambled away from their smoldering hideout. Shooting out from a crumbling roof was Corvaefire. Dr. Light dangled upside down by his ankle, which was clenched in her fist. He was unconscious, his suit tattered enough to display old circuitry and outdated wires. 

“Yo,” Corvaefire said. Harlequin Rose saw her shadowy silhouette salute. “I dunno if we were supposed to wait for a signal. I just got really hungry thinking about steak and thought ‘huh, you know, I can just teleport’ so I did. Can we get steak now?”

“Dude, we  _ just _ had pizza!” Blue Beetle said. From across the block, Harlequin Rose saw--and heard--the low buzz of his scarab companion humming into life, sending the teenage hero into the air on two sets of dragonfly-esque wings and alien plasma. “How are you still hungry?!”

“I’m blaming the demon part for this one. So like, yo, steak?”

“I demand a horse!” Aquagirl said. A spout of water carried her above the skyline. “Or perhaps a llama!”

“Do they serve llama? Are they allowed? Like, legally, are they allowed?” 

“Is this allowed?” Harlequin Rose echoed Blue Beetle. “ _ Is this allowed? _ ”

She saw him pointing at her, and raising both his arms in the air. Harlequin Rose basked briefly in the warmth of both the fire, and the victory of nailing a Vine reference. Her mama would be proud.

“Okay, everybody focus!” Robin bellowed. “Titans,  _ go! _ ” 

“Go where?” Beetle asked.

“The--the get away vans!” Harlequin couldn’t see Robin, but she knew who he was under the mask, and she knew he was stomping his foot while pointing in the direction of the warehouse’s parking lot. Goons were collecting into electrician vans en masse. “ _ Stop the get away vans! _ ” 

“A please would be nice,” Harlequin Rose couldn’t help but needle. 

“ _ I said Titans, go so  _ ** _TITANS, GO!_ ** ”

“Sheesh!” Harlequin Rose hurried off to the opposite end of the roof, bouncing on the balls of her ballet slippers. “I’m gonna tell Nanny you’re a grouch before nine. She’s gonna make  _ so _ much fun of you.”

“Ooh, that sounds like another story,” Corvaefire pondered.

Robin was silent; Harlequin Rose wondered if he’d crushed his communicator again. Someone needed to enroll him in anger management, or maybe put itching powder spores in his underwear drawer. Again. Maybe both; Harlequin Rose had all night now that the stakeout was turning toward a steak-out. 

“Heh,” she chuckled to herself.

No more time for puns; she launched forward into a sprint. Fearlessly, she flung herself off of the roof and nosedived; she caught herself on the streetlamp and swung her legs forward, sending her into a rotation twice before she let go. Harlequin Rose twisted in the air, winked at the three cute girls recording her on their phones, and pulled her ribbon rod its spot just beneath the first pink fold of her tutu. A flick of her wrist, and the hyper strength ribbon was cast out like a whip, grappling onto the closest fire escape.

A push of the button, and Harlequin Rose retracted the ribbon, the momentum carrying her up into further acrobatics. She couldn’t help it; a cackle left her throat, girlish laughter peppering the night. 

“Someone’s having fun!” Blue Beetle laughed along with her, almost lost in the rush of wind through her communicator. As Harlequin Rose flipped onto the roof, she gave her friend a grin as he zoomed by her, his arms morphing into twin canons to take out one of the vans desperately burning rubber to escape the Teen Titans. 

Would they ever learn? Probably not. Harlequin Rose let out a whoop as she took another dive from the roof, using her ribbon as a swing to land in a crouch on top of a second van. This one had a sunroof! Sweet. She lifted herself on her hands and brought both feet down, easily falling inside. She was, after all, the ‘tiniest’ member of the group. 

The metal grate and intact glass both made contact with a henchman just beneath her; she sat criss-cross-apple-sauce on his back while he groaned in pain.

“Evenin’, fellas!” Harlequin Rose said, even as the two remaining punks--minus the fearfully shouting driver--leveled pistols at her face. “Say, you wouldn’t happen to know if any steak houses are open this time of night? We’d go to Texas Road House, buuuut that’s alllll the way on the other side of Jump City, and like, it’s  _ late _ …”

“T-t-there’s Waffle House,” said one. He was sweating through his balaclava. 

“Shut it, Ted!” hissed his friend. “Listen up, pipsqueak! D-don’t you move a muscle, or we’ll shoot! I swear to God!”

“Oh, don’t’cha worry, I won’t move!” 

“You…” Ted blinked. “You won’t?”

“Nah!” Harlequin Rose smiled, her teeth sharp, as she felt the heat in her skin; she didn’t have to look to know that her eyes were dark and the skin around her hands and arms were turning a cheerfully poisonous green. “Don’t need to.”

Mom had always taught her restraint when using her pheromones; predictably, she’d never taught Harlequin Rose how to use the lovey-dovey ones, since she was fourteen and all. Honestly, Harlequin Rose was already anticipating having to figure out the proper molecular configuration on her own. Mom was always, well,  _ prickly _ at the thought of Harlequin Rose getting lovey with anyone. Mama was the same; overprotective supervillains to a fault. 

But still, Harlequin Rose had a way with words. And the ability to produce microscopic spores from her bare skin, spores that were already flooding the van in seconds. A few adjustments to their dopamine responses to her voice, a hint of her signature roseoil scent, a smack of marijuana-adjacent chemicals, aaaaand…

_ Got’em! _ “Ted, Asshole, do me a solid and put the safety back on your guns.”

The boys complied easily. Ted was caught in a giggling fit, and as soon as the safety was on his gun, it was falling limply from his hands. 

“How about we start goin’ the speed limit, fellas?” she suggested. She felt the van slow down. “Awesome. Hey, my guy, what’s your name?”

“Carl,” slurred the driver.

“Carl, can you turn us around and drive back to the warehouse for me? I don’t wanna miss my friends.”

“Sure thing!” Carl made a very legal turn at the next light, and they were cruising back from whence they came. 

When they pulled to a halt, Robin was already kicking out a trussed up bundle of bruised and battered boys from the back of his van. Blue Beetle had done the same, and both of them semi scowled when Harlequin Rose’s catch parked by the street, and her goons calmly filtered out with doped grins, carrying the unconscious fourth one between them. 

“Wassup, losers,” Harlequin Rose wiggled her fingers in greeting. She tutted in faux disappointment and lifted her hands in a  _ what can ya do _ shrug. “Trust the boys to be the most violent.” 

Corvaefire landed hard enough to crater the concrete. She did not move to keep Dr. Light’s--helmeted! Thank God, he had a helmet!--head from smacking against the ground as well. The supervillain let out a pained groan, but remained unconscious. 

Robin, smarting from Harlequin Rose’s dig, pointed at the fine cloaked redhead with a silent glare. 

“That’s not violent. That’s getting results,” said Harlequin Rose. “Right, Corvae?”

“I don’t really care,” replied Corvaefire. “I’m in this for the steak.”

“I still don’t think like--I don’t think bein’ so rough on them is allowed,” Blue Beetle said softly, looking around. “Or uh, super drugging them, for that matter.”

“They’re only a little drugged!” Ted chose that moment to curl up on the ground and fall asleep. Robin’s scowl, somehow, carved deeper. Like he’d sucked on a bad lemon. “Well, Ted’s a pussy, so.”

“Robin, you’ve been in this since you were ten,” Beetle said, looking toward their (admittedly self appointed) leader. “Is that allowed?” 

“Is  _ what _ allowed?!” Aquagirl asked as she flooded the backstreets, surfing on the back of--that was a turtle, Harlequin Rose realized. Looked a little more magical than a regular sea turtle, if the six eyes and enormous size were any indication, but still, she doubted that it liked having a teenager standing on its back and using it as a mode of transportation. On the crest of a wave was the final van, and Aquagirl let that drop to the ground front first.

“Yeah, yeah, okay, alright, we’re violent,” Harlequin Rose said without needing to look at Robin and Blue Beetle’s faces. 

Aquagirl vaulted off of the back of her turtle, her coral tiara and scaled bodysuit glittering in the firelight. She lifted a free hand and summoned a bubble of water to surround and keep her turtle aloft. “Why are we speaking of violence? Are we doing crimes next? I wanna do a crime! I wanna do  _ so _ many crimes!”

“We’re superheros, Aquagirl!” Blue Beetle admonished. “We can’t do crimes. Hey, by the way, does being a vigilante count as a crime?”

“Huh,” said Corvaefire, shaking Dr. Light a little bit, presumably to keep the blood in his body circulating properly. “I never actually thought about that. We... _ are _ causing property damage. Kinda like a sports riot.” 

“Yay!” Aquagirl squealed. “ _ Riot! _ ” 

She smashed in the window of the getaway van with her forked scepter. There was screaming, and then Aquagirl grappled the driver by the scruff and hauled the blubbering man out, tossing him out to the ground. 

“Hey,” Harlequin Rose said, “think we should do something about the fire? It’s kinda, hm, big. And Aquagirl can control water...so...”

They stared as Aquagirl began to viciously stab the vehicle with her scepter. 

“Eh, don’t spoil her fun. Fire department’s got this, right?” Corvaefire watched as red trucks pulled up as if on cue, unspooling their hoses and taking position. “Bitchin.”

Robin put his face in his hands, and there it remained even as the police came to collect their catch, the press arrived to talk about it, and several teen girls asked if they could take a selfie with the Titans. Aquagirl demanded to know what a selfie was, and when it was explained, proceeded to photobomb every selfie to their fans’ delight. 

“Alright, folks! We’re more than happy to help!” Harlequin Rose waved goodbye as Corvaefire scooped her up in a fireman carry. “But now; we steak! Titans, go! To  _ Waffle House! _ ” 

“ _ Hey! _ ” Robin shrieked as the Teen Titans took off into the night. 

Thirty minutes, a costume change, and a seating at the Waffle House later found everyone moderately happy; or, at least in Damien’s case, marginally less grumpy. Marginally. He had his coffee and wasn’t saying anything rude, which meant he was at least not as livid as Lucy expected.

“You got anymore stories?” Jaime said around a mouthful of eggs, mopping up the yolk with his toast. “I can’t imagine gettin’ raised by supervillains as anything less than...uh…”

“Fun? Exciting? Full of fantastic experiences that shaped me into the stellar specimen of today?” Lucy asked with a grin. 

“Insane,” Aza’rmand’r grunted. She cut her steak in half and shoved it in her mouth. Her second pair of eyes blinked sleepily through a fringe of dark, tousled bangs. She was more demon than alien when powered down.

“I mean, duh, they’re both mentally ill. Jackass.” Lucy did push her bacon toward Aza’r anyway; even if she was non-practicing, she avoided shellfish and pork on principal. “But yeah, actually, it’s pretty insane. Lotta fun. I love’em but hoo, there’s a reason I like my tights, and it’s not because I’m all that well adjusted.”

“Tell us another tale!” Limera said, strawberry blonde curls bouncing around her face. She always looked semi-damp--an Atlantean necessity, so she claimed. It just reminded Lucy of Mom’s more delicate specimens; Lucy had a spritz bottle full of water in her purse just in case Limera needed a touch up. Instinct.

“Okay,” Lucy said. “I guess...hmmm...I can tell you about my first Halloween?”

“Oooh, yes! That one, that one!” Limera beamed. “What’s a Halloween?”

Damien scoffed. Lucy glared. She was half tempted to douse him with peanut oil again, but that seemed too mean to do after they semi-ruined his stake out plans. He wasn’t saying anything about it--yet--but Lucy knew that he’d spent at least three to five hours researching and planning out the perfect strike effort that wouldn’t have had the Titans all over Twitter. 

...She was still going to put itching powder in his undies, though. 

“Alright,” Lucy said, cutting into her waffles. “So, I had just turned seven, and I was  _ super _ into Steven Universe…”


End file.
